Kasmaal  Independent Somali news and analysis website .

© Sergey Pivovarov / Sputnik A Russian military transport airplane has crashed during landing at Khmeimim Airbase in Syria. Six crew members as well as 33 passengers, all of them military personnel, were killed in the crash. According to preliminary information, the incident could have been caused by a technical malfunction, the Russian defense ministry […]

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un agrees to meet South Korea’s president and impose a moratorium on nuclear tests. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has agreed to meet South Korea’s president next month and impose a moratorium on nuclear and missile tests if his country holds talks with the United States, a senior South Korean official said on […]

Men pray at a mosque in Madrid. Photo: AFP There were 546 reported incidents of Islamophobia in Spain in 2017, according to a report released Friday by the Citizens’ Platform Against Islamophobia (PCI). The Local breaks down the most important information from the annual report here: What types of incidents were reported? The most frequent type of […]

Toby Melville / Reuters A 33-year-old woman discovered next to a former Russian double agent has been identified as his daughter. Sergei Skripal, a 66-year-old former spy and his 33-year-old daughter, Yulia, were found on Sunday unconscious on a bench outside a shopping center in the English city of Salisbury, after exposure to what police […]

Kurdish fighters of SDF ride in a truck passing damaged buildings in Raqqa on October 20, 2017. (AFP) US-backed Kurdish fighters in northern Syria are heading to the Turkish-assaulted Kurdish enclave of Afrin, leading to an “operational pause” in their operations against ISIS, the Pentagon said Monday. The Syrian Democratic Alliance, made up mainly of […]

Five Star Movement leader Luigi Di Maio speaking after the election. Photo: Filippo Monteforte/AFP The Italian election was a rejection of traditional left and right parties in both the north and south of the country — but for different reasons, experts said. The far-right League party conquered the north, worried about the rise in immigration, while the […]

Kim Jong-un was pictured welcoming delegates to the dinner North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has said he wants to “vigorously advance” closer ties with South Korea, according to state media. The report follows a rare visit to Pyongyang by senior South Korean officials, who had dinner with the normally reclusive leader. They are the first […]

Election posters in Rome. Photo: Alberto Pizzoli/AFP Italy’s general election has resulted in a hung parliament in which no single party or coalition commands an overall majority, leaving few options for any new government. The prospect of a grand coalition between Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia (Go Italy) party and the ruling centre-left Democratic Party, envisaged before […]

Donald Trump. Photo: DPA The German government warned Monday that a transatlantic trade war would harm both Europe and the US, urging Washington not to take a “wrong path” after a weekend of aggressive trade rhetoric. “I don’t want to judge how close to or far from a trade war we are. Such a trade […]

International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) convoy seen crossing into eastern Ghoutanear Wafideen camp in Damascus [Omar Sanadiki/Reuters] A 46-truck aid convoy enters the rebel enclave, home to nearly 400,000 people, for the first time in three weeks.  humanitarian aid has begun entering Eastern Ghouta through the government-controlled Wafideen checkpoint for the first time […]